World economic growth dependent on vaccine development for COVID-19

On October 13, 2020, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) revised its World Economic Outlook (WEO). The IMF forecasts the world economy to grow 4.4% negatively in 2020 and has revised it up 0.8 points from the world economy as of June 2020. Huge fiscal mobilization from each country has reduced the extent of the deterioration of the world economy. However, the deterioration of the world economy in 2020 is large compared to the 0.1% decrease in the world economy during the financial crisis in 2009. In the IMF report, the economic loss caused by the slowdown in world economic growth has been estimated at 28 trillion dollars over the next six years.

The world economy has returned to a recovery trajectory from the July-September period of 2020, as major countries in the world have made huge fiscal mobilizations totaling $ 12 trillion. Vaccines against COVID-19 are expected to become widespread in 2021, so the world economy is projected to grow by 5.2%.

In Japan, the increase in the number of people infected with SARS-CoV-2 is relatively restrained. As a result, Japan's economic growth rate in 2020 is projected to be minus 5.3%, which has been revised upward by 0.5 points from the forecast of Japan's economic growth rate as of June 2020. However, the revised economic growth rate is the same negative growth as Japan's economic growth rate of 5.4% decline immediately after the financial crisis in 2009. In 2021, Japan's economic growth rate is expected to return to a gradual recovery trajectory with a positive growth of 2.3%.

The IMF has estimated down and up scenarios for world economic growth, depending on the prevalence of vaccines against COVID-19. If the development of a vaccine against COVID-19 is delayed and it is difficult to end COVID-19, the world economic growth rate in 2021 will decrease by 3 points from the basic scenario of 5% level. If the vaccine against COVID-19 spreads faster than expected, the world economic growth rate in 2021 will increase by 0.5 points.　                                                                              JAMA Published on October by Kyoto@Takuma H